Growing college fair serves Native American students, shows a path to higher education

The annual Native American College Fair brought in over 1,200 students from across Minnesota and surrounding states to the Minnesota History Center in St. Paul on Monday. 

The fair began in 2013, hosting around 50 students and families. Since then, it has grown into an event with over 40 colleges represented. Organizers say colleges at the fair have programming aimed towards Indigenous students in academics or extracurricular activities.  

Kerrie Troseth is an Indian Education Program counselor with St. Paul Public Schools, which has been a partner of the fair for several years. She says the fair eases students’ anxieties and concerns about higher education pathways.  

“[The fair] helps them start to forge these relationships and look at college as a serious option, to get to know other Native professionals who are involved in college planning,” Troseth said. 

Every year the fair focuses on different career categories. This year’s focus was on health care. Organizers say the theme was chosen by students via surveys that were distributed to schools. 

Feather LaRoche works at the University of Minnesota School of Public Health. He says there is a need for health care and public health care workers in Indigenous communities. 

LaRoche gave demonstrations to interested students with three newly pitched online learning modules designed to incorporate Indigenous knowledge and traditions into public health settings.  

“These are designed to say, ‘Hey, we care about you. We want you to know this. We want you to learn this. You are important to us. Your health means the future to our community,’” LaRoche said.  

He says the modules have yet to be fully approved but has hopes they can be made available to teens considering careers in public health.  

Fond du Lac Tribal and Community College was also one of the many colleges present at the fair. The college is located in Cloquet and has ties in Ojibwe cultural values and standards into its curriculum.  

“In health care ... how do different cultures approach things like death and dying, or maybe the gift of new life?” Josh Cleveland, an admissions officer, said. “How do we make sure that we're honoring the cultures of those people that we're serving out in our communities?”  

Troseth says since the fair began, she has seen an increase of interest in her students when it comes to thinking about higher education as a possibility.  

“We want them to be the future for their communities and to help discover new things and to treat them, not just in westernized ways, but also to integrate traditional ways into medicine and healthcare,” Troseth said.  

The Native American College Fair is open to schools, families and adult learners interested in learning more about higher education.  

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